Ghana’s drone delivery deal suffers a jolt over lawsuit

A Ghanaian lawmaker has sued the
government for sole sourcing a $12 million medical deliveries through drones
with Fly Zipline Ghana Limited.

Opposition MP Ernest Norgbey contends per the Public Procurement Act, there was
no justification for the government to sole-source the contract to
Fly Zipline.

The Ashaiman legislator is seeking a
declaration that “the Government of Ghana erred in using single sourcing method
of procurement in engaging Fly Zipline Ghana Ltd for the implementation of
Zipline RPAS for the delivery of blood products.”

He also wants a declaration that the service agreement
was “illegal and therefore void” and an order “invalidating the service
agreement.”

The National Democratic Congress legislator argues that other options
were not assessed before the government settled on Fly Zipline for the
implementation of the project.

He further argues in the writ that the
government “did not do due diligence or survey the market before embarking on
single sourcing method of procurement.”

The MP maintains further that “the government has an
obligation to do due diligence and survey the market to ascertain that a
company [Fly Zipline] is the only supplier or service provider before using the
single sourcing method of procurement.”

Zipline’s Safety System

Zipline’s drone
delivery service is dedicated to expanding healthcare access and saving lives
around the globe. Health workers place orders by text message and receive their
deliveries in 30 minutes on average. Zipline’s drones both take off and land
from its distribution centers, requiring no additional infrastructure at the
clinics it serves. Deliveries are made from the sky, with the drone descending
to a safe height above the ground and air-dropping medicine by parachute to a
designated spot at the health centers it serves.

Because the
company’s drones criss-cross commercial airspace daily over both remote and
populated areas on their way to deliver critical and lifesaving medicine to
people in need, the safety and reliability of Zipline’s service is a top
priority. Recently, the United States Federal Aviation Administration announced
that it may require the U.S. commercial drone industry in future regulation to
adopt the kinds of safety features Zipline has already put in place. The
company has taken many steps to ensure that it is operating the safest delivery
system of its kind in the world including rigorous testing of flight software
and aircraft hardware; flight operations safety procedures; redundant inflight
safety features; and modular frangible design.

Rigorous Testing of Flight Software and Aircraft
Hardware

The company works to improve the quality of its code and
service every day to make sure it is operating the safest and most effective
drone delivery operation in the world. All software updates are first put
through automated software and hardware in the loop testing. Allowing advanced
algorithms to assess how the new code and aircraft would perform in the real
world.

After passing
through simulation testing, all new code is installed onto drones at our state
of the art flight testing facility in Northern California, Codenamed Nest X,
and pushed to the limits to validate performance. That process is repeated
until the system and aircraft are ready to be deployed into global flight
operations.

Flight
Operation and Safety

Flight operators physically inspect each aircraft and
use cutting edge technology like computer vision during preflight checks to
make sure each drone is fit for flight. Because Zipline’s drones fly
autonomously along predetermined routes, all of our flight paths are registered
in advance with civil aviation authorities.

Zipline is in direct communication with those aviation
authorities so that they know at all times when drones launch and where they
are flying. Zipline’s sophisticated air traffic control system uses advanced
algorithms to make sure all drones in the air know where they are, where they
need to go.

Redundant In-flight Safety Features

Zipline drones are designed to automatically detect
issues inflight and safely

return to base for repair. Each drone is equipped with
redundant flight computers, motors, communications systems, flight control
surfaces, as well as redundant navigation and power systems.

In the event of emergencies like severe weather,
emergency requests from air traffic control or unplanned flight operation
issues, each drone is equipped with a parachute that allows it to make an
immediate landing by slowly descending to the ground.

The drones use parachute landings at least once a
week during the the testing and diagnostic phase of beginning new distribution
centers and delivery routes or when the company decides to make deliveries in
the face of extreme weather to aid in emergency medical situations.

Modular Frangible Design

Zipline’s drones and its parts are designed to
break on contact minimizing potential damage to things on the ground. The
drone’s core navigation, power, communications, and computing functions are
inserted into the drone as a single unit. That unit is housed within a carbon
fiber chassis that is protected by an outer styrofoam shell, similar to
construction of helmets. The styrofoam serves to protect anything on the
outside of the drone as well as everything on the inside.

Damaged styrofoam is quickly replaced allowing the drone to return to service. The same is true for other flight modules, which include the motors, wings, tail fins and power, navigation and communications unit. If any one of those units experiences issues, it can be easily replaced with a new one so that the aircraft can return to service saving lives as quickly as possible.